Senior DevOps Engineer

Skydance offers a dynamic, inclusive, and ever-evolving culture where innovative ideas are welcomed, and growth fostered. The partnership between unique creativity and technological advancements are demonstrated within each pillar of the company. At the heart of it all is a commitment to boldly entertaining and relevant storytelling.

While all Animation studios look to hire people who are creative and hard-working, Skydance Animation is specifically looking for pioneers who seek to push the limits of what the world’s most collaborative art form can achieve, and to give those pioneers the space and the resources to build a new studio that’s doing something different.

If you’ve ever dreamt of what the early days of Hollywood must have been like, of what it takes to roll up your sleeves and break new ground, figure out a new process, and to one day say, “I was there when it all began,” then welcome aboard…

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The Senior DevOps Engineer is a senior member of the Information Technology organization, responsible for applying modern DevOps practices to a large, existing production environment.

This role is not greenfield. You will work within a mature, heterogeneous infrastructure, on-premises and cloud, progressively introducing automation, standardization, and reliability improvements without disrupting active production.

You will partner closely with Pipeline, Production Technology, Security, and Engineering teams to influence how infrastructure is designed, delivered, and operated, acting as a technical driver for DevOps principles across the studio.

Responsibilities

• Apply DevOps principles to an existing, production-critical IT environment, balancing modernization with stability
• Design, implement, and operate a global Linux ecosystem supporting workstations, servers, and animation production pipelines
• Partner with Pipeline, Production, and Technology teams to introduce infrastructure-as-code, automation standards, and repeatable deployment patterns
• Identify high-value manual, error-prone, or inconsistent operational processes and replace them with automated solutions using Terraform, Ansible, and Python
• Architect, provision, and maintain infrastructure across AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, and OCI, including compute, storage, networking, and virtualization
• Own end-to-end technical designs for infrastructure projects, including prioritization, implementation, documentation, and operational handoff
• Maintain a deep understanding of studio workflows and collaborate with Production Technology to evolve systems alongside production needs
• Design, build, and maintain CI/CD pipelines; guide development teams toward reliable build, test, and deployment practices
• Define and promote best-in-class CI/CD, source control, and branching strategies in collaboration with Engineering and Security teams
• Design, operate, and maintain render farm infrastructure, with a focus on configuration management and performance monitoring
• Present technical options to leadership, including architectural trade-offs, cost analysis, and risk considerations
• Act as a technical advocate for automation, observability, and reliability across IT and production-facing teams
• Participate in a 24×7 production on-call rotation, focusing on root-cause analysis and long-term remediation
• Mentor junior engineers and help raise the overall operational maturity of the IT organization

Requirements

• 8+ years of experience as a DevOps Engineer, Site Reliability Engineer, or equivalent role supporting production systems
• Strong hands-on experience with infrastructure automation and configuration management (Terraform, Ansible, Puppet, or similar)
• Proficiency in scripting and programming for systems integration and automation (Python required; Bash, Go, or similar preferred)
• End-to-end experience designing and operating CI/CD pipelines in production environments
• Demonstrated experience architecting and operating infrastructure in one or more major cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP, and/or OCI)
• Solid Linux systems administration experience, including application deployment, service troubleshooting, and containerized workloads
• Experience operating and supporting source control platforms (e.g., GitHub), including branching and release workflows
• Hands-on experience with containerization and Kubernetes-based platforms in production environments
• Strong communication skills with the ability to clearly explain technical concepts to both technical and non-technical stakeholders
• Proven problem-solving ability and a pragmatic approach to operational reliability
• Experience with identity and access management systems, including MFA providers (Okta, Duo) and authentication protocols (LDAP, Active Directory, SAML, OAuth), a plus
• Working knowledge of NFS and SMB file protocols across Linux, macOS, and Windows environments, including performance and reliability considerations, a plus
• Experience operating file transfer and content distribution systems (e.g., Box, Dropbox, OneDrive, Signiant, Aspera, FTP, Filerunner), a plus
• Prior experience in animation, visual effects, or media and entertainment environments, a plus
• Reduce manual, ad-hoc infrastructure changes by replacing them with reproducible, automated workflows
• Increase consistency and reliability across environments without disrupting active production
• Improve system observability, debuggability, and operational confidence through better tooling and standards
• Deliver incremental modernization that leaves systems more maintainable than you found them
• Build trust with engineers, pipeline, and production teams by shipping practical improvements that solve real problems
• Raise the overall DevOps maturity of the IT organization through example, documentation, and mentorship

The compensation for this exempt position in Los Angeles, CA is $145,000-175,000 annually. The rate offered may vary based on the candidate’s location, qualifications, experience and relevant expertise, among other factors. The range indicated is for base salary only and does not reflect the total compensation package, including bonus, benefits, etc.

#animation

Skydance is a diversified media company founded by David Ellison in 2010 to create high quality, event-level entertainment for global audiences. The Company brings to life stories of immersive worlds across its feature film, television, interactive, and animation divisions.

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